President Obama on Tuesday threatened to veto a pair of Republican bills in the House which would delay the employer and individual mandates for one year in the Obama health reform laws, as GOP leaders pressed Democrats to break ranks with the White House on the issue.
"The law isn’t wonderful, it’s a train wreck," said Speaker John Boehner on the House floor.
"You know it. I know it. And the American people know it. Even the president knows it. That’s why he proposed delaying his mandate on employers," Boehner added.
But the White House wasn't buying that argument, saying any move to delay the two mandates would "cost millions of hard working middle class families the security of affordable health coverage."
"If the President were presented" with the two bills, "he would veto them," read a White House statement.
"But it’s unfair to protect big businesses without giving the same relief to American families and small businesses," the Speaker countered, as Republicans tried to put the heat on Democrats to support the mandate delay.
But there wasn't much evidence that Democrats were ready to break with their leaders, even though polls have shown unease with the Obama health reform law and its details.
Republicans though also pointed to recent stories about the delay in the employer mandate, arguing it negatively impacts other areas in the law.
This from the AP:
Enforcement of the law's central requirement -- that individual Americans must have coverage -- could be weakened by the administration's recent delay of another mandate that larger employers provide medical insurance.
It's because the delayed rule also required companies to report health insurance details for employees. Without employers validating who's covered, a scofflaw could lie, and the government would have no easy way to check.
The Treasury Department said Tuesday it expects any impact to be minor, since most people will not risk telling the government a lie. Still, it's another incentive for uninsured people to ignore a costly new government requirement.
A House panel on Wednesday holds a second hearing on the delay of the employer mandate; this time, the Obama Administration is sending a lower level official to testify on the decision to delay the employer mandate tax penalties until 2015.
Meanwhile, another committee will look at how the IRS and other agencies will deal with enforcement of the health care law, and deal with privacy, security and fraud issues associated with its implementation.
The Acting head of the IRS will testify at that hearing before going to another in the afternoon about the Tea Party targeting scandal.
